During the discharging of a re-chargeable battery, lead-dioxide and sulphuric acid ions are converted to lead-sulphate at the positive plate or electrode of the battery cell and lead and sulphuric acid ions are converted to lead-sulphate at the negative plate or electrode. Correspondingly, lead-sulphate is converted to active material, i.e. lead-dioxide and sulphuric acid ions at the positive plate and lead and sulphuric acid ions at the negative plate, during the charging of the battery. However, this lead-sulphate may form a coating on the plates, which increases the internal resistance of the battery. If the battery has been discharged to a large extent, i.e. the amount of active material has decreased to very low level, which may occur if the battery has been unused for a long period of time, for example, during long-term storage (e.g. a battery of an engine of a boat where the engine has been unused during the winter), the internal resistance of the battery may increase to an extent that the battery cannot be charged using a normal charging cycle. This is due to the fact that the high internal resistance entails that the charging voltage rapidly rises to the normal maximum level, 2.3-2.5 V/cell, or to a total voltage of 14.4-14.9 V, even at small charging currents, which, in turn, entails to that the conversion of lead-sulphate to active material is prevented or that a very low amount of material is converted. For this reason, many conventional battery chargers fail in charging batteries in this condition.
Attempts have been made in order to overcome this severe problem with re-chargeable batteries. One example is chargers and methods at chargers that try to solve this problem by delivering a very low charging current and thereby avoiding this rapid increase of charging voltage. However, for this solution, the charging period inevitably will become very long due to the low current. On the other hand, chargers and methods at chargers have been developed that allow a high voltage over the battery, in some applications even more than 20 V. This solution has the drawback that the battery has to be disconnected from the vehicle or the apparatus during the charging period, since such a high charging voltage may, for example, damage the electronics included in the vehicle or apparatus.
One way to prevent the battery from discharging during long-term storage to the extent that a re-charging of the battery becomes difficult or impossible, is to keep the battery under maintenance charging during the storage period. Commonly, a maintenance charging procedure is performed in accordance with two different methods, float charging and pulse or hysteresis charging.
According to the first method, float charging, the voltage over the battery is set to a lower level, typically 13.2-13.9 V, and the battery is held at a charge level of approximately 100%. This method suffers, however, from an enhanced water segregation, which negatively affects the duration of the battery. Further, the lead-sulphate content, in a valve regulated battery, can be enhanced at the negative electrode, which may increase the lead-sulphate coating of the electrode and thereby increase the internal resistance of the battery.
In accordance with the second method, the voltage over the battery is monitored and if the voltage drops below a predetermined threshold level, typically 12.6-13 V, a voltage pulse is applied. Normally, the charge level of a battery subjected to such a maintenance charging method will be below 100%, i.e. the battery is not completely charged.
Thus, it is a difficult problem to find a method and a charger that provide a fast, reliable, and safe charging of a discharged battery, independently of the levels of active material of the battery, i.e., independently of the internal resistance of the battery.
Further, there is a problem to find a method and a charger that provide a maintenance charging that keeps the battery at a capacity level of 100% or near 100% at the same time as the enhancement of the water segregation is prevented and the lead-sulphate content is kept a low level.